Archive for the ‘Atheism’ Category

..One of the stars of Duck Dynasty, Si Robertson, was recently speaking to the Christian Post about an upcoming film he’s in called “Faith Of Our Fathers.” During the interview Robertson said he doesn’t believe Atheists exist because of…calendars?

Nice..
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Religion is rapidly losing the youngest generation of Americans, according to new research.

America’s rising generation of adults are the least religiously observant of any generation in six decades, determined an expansive study led by Jean Twenge, a psychology professor at San Diego State.

“Unlike previous studies, ours is able to show that millennials’ lower religious involvement is due to cultural change, not to millennials being young and unsettled,” Twenge says in a San Diego State University news release. .

In one of the largest studies ever conducted on Americans’ religious involvement, researchers from Case Western Reserve University and the University of Georgia collaborated with Twenge and her colleagues in California to analyze data from four national surveys of U.S. adolescents between the ages of 13 and 18. The surveys were taken between 1966 and 2014, and include responses from some 11.2 million people.

The researchers’ findings were published this month in PLOS One.

According to Twenge and her cohorts, today’s adolescents view religion as less important, report less “approval” of religious organizations, and spend less time on prayer than did their similarly-aged predecessors. Some 75 percent of American 12th graders, the paper finds, believe that religion is “not important at all” in their lives.Read more
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The latest polls show that Turkey’s President and former Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan may have to form a coalition government following the June 7 elections. In its unlucky 13th year in rule, Erdogan’s AKP has suffered several image attacks in recent months, triggering defections among erstwhile supporters to other parties, especially within Turkey’s minorities.

Among his opponents, a newly-formed group of “Istanbullu” – those born and raised in Istanbul – has grown steadily over the past year and now numbers around 150 individuals across Turkey. Without a party-political agenda, the country’s first official atheism league, Ateizm Dernegi, says that it wants to create a platform for like-minded people amid the AKP-driven climate of political Islam.

“Being an atheist in Turkey is not exactly a desirable label. We few are wearing it proudly and we refuse to be silenced by the fear and threats,” Morgan Romano, vice-president of the association, said at the group’s first public conference in Germany on Sunday.

“The term ‘atheist’ is used as a harsh insult – one of the harshest in the country. Furthermore, atheists are commonly and publicly discriminated against and are subjects of public and private hate speech in Yeni Turkiye all the time.”

Morgan Romano says that atheists in Turkey suffer from persecution and discrimination

Romano repeatedly referred to present-day Turkey as ‘yeni Turkiye’ – the ‘new Turkey’, and its “booming Islamism growing at a rate unlike any other nation”. Born and raised in the US, Romano described how she considered herself part of the old Turkey before the AKP’s rise to power.Read more
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—An atheist in New Jersey has won the right to sue after she was allegedly denied a request for a vanity license plate that read “8THEIST.”

According to Nj.com, this week U.S. District Court Freda Wolfson judge struck down an attempt by the state of New Jersey to dismiss a lawsuit filed by Shannon Morgan, a resident of Leesburg. Morgan, who identifies as atheist, claims she visited the state Motor Vehicle Commission’s (MVC) website in November 2013 and entered “8THEIST” as her preferred title for a vanity plate. Her submission was rebuffed, however, with the website telling her that the “requested plate is considered objectionable.” When Morgan tried “BAPTIST” as another option, she was reportedly allowed to proceed through the registration process.

Morgan eventually filed a lawsuit in April of last year, accusing the commission of violating her free speech. Officials, in turn, insisted her case was invalid because the rejection was the result of a “computer error,” not intentional discrimination, noting they eventually allowed her to have the license plate anyway. But Morgan’s lawyers say the issue is bigger than one license plate, and pointed out that the commission’s rules — specifically a policy that allows the MVC to decline plates they deem “offensive to good taste and decency” — are still in place, which they say grants the government “unbridled discretion to prohibit speech based on the speaker’s viewpoint.”Read more

The country is a buzz with new survey data showing that the numbers of Christians have been dropping precipitously over the over the past seven or eight years. What is to blame for this change? Well, Bill O’Reilly has a theory.

Adjust, adjust the bible??? Just close this religion thing and throw it on the garbage dump of history and forget this god business, it’s all man-made/imaginary anyways :)
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(WBIR) – Across the nation the number of Christians is dropping.

A Pew Research poll shows the number of people with no religion is growing.

These two groups are on the opposite end when it comes to beliefs, but agree when it comes to why churches may be seeing fewer numbers.

Two big reasons – not answering questions of faith and not being open to today’s society.

Kory Queen serves as a campus minister at the University of Tennessee. He hails from the Northwest and has seen firsthand why some churches struggle to retain members.

“The ones that are not surviving as well are holding on to traditions that are more oppressive, whether it be towards women or minorities,” explained Queen.

He believes churches have to adjust to keep their doors open.Read more
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Christianity still dominates American religious identity (70%), but the survey shows dramatic shifts as more people move out the doors of denominations, shedding spiritual connections along the way.

Atheists and agnostics have nearly doubled their share of the religious marketplace, and overall indifference to religion of any sort is rising as well. Only the historically black Protestant churches have held a steady grip through the years of change.

Remember the familiar map of American religion? The South: A bastion of white evangelicals. The Northeast: Cradle of Catholics. The Midwest: Nest of Mainline Protestants. The West: Incubator of “nones” — people who claim no religious brand label.

:( The madness of religion
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A blogger has been hacked to death by a masked gang in Bangladesh – the third such murder of a critic of religious extremism in three months.

Ananta Bijoy Das, 33, wrote for the Mukto-Mona (Free Mind) website which describes itself as a space for “freethinkers, sceptics, atheists and humanists”.

“Attackers wearing masks hacked Ananta Bijoy Das with machetes in Sylhet city at around 8.30am this morning. We have learnt that he was a writer,” deputy commissioner of Sylhet police Faisal Mahmud said.

The front page of the website now displays the message “We are united in grief and remain undefeated” written in white on a black background.

A friend of Mr Das claims he had received death threats and was on a hitlist of atheist bloggers drawn up by Islamist militants. His death marks an escalation in religious violence in the country.

Mukto-Mona used to be moderated by Avijit Roy, 43, a Bangladeshi-born US citizen living in Atlanta, who was hacked to death in the capital Dhaka in February.

Mr Roy was a prominent voice against religious intolerance, and his family and friends said he had been threatened for his writings.Read more
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